Torture and the Ticking Bomb, by Bob Brecher: A Review
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Date
2017-10
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Asian Journal of Humanities and Social Studies
Abstract
A number of terror attacks have furthered the notoriety of terrorists. Such attacks include the ones in Bali, London,
Nairobi, Kikambala, Dar-el-salaam, Kampala, New York, the fortune spent to bring down Osama bin Laden and more
recently the sporadic terror attacks in different towns in Kenya culminating in the Westgate attack. Immediately after the
9/11 bombings, the then US President, George W. Bush declared that — in the war against terror — countries were either
with the USA or with the terrorists. This declaration created an equal and opposite assumption that ‘those’ fighting terror
were thereby justified in the manner they terror suspects. As a result, dangerous escapades have been reported in
Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq. Simultaneously, tales of torture have surrounded the debate on the rationale of holding
suspects at Guantanamo Bay. In a nutshell, the role of interrogators has come under sharp focus particularly in the
inhumane manner that terrorism suspects have been handled. Complaints have ranged from rendition to torture. The role
of the investigator in torturing a suspect, or what has been called interrogational torture, has been a topic of discussion in
many civil society engagements around the globe.
Description
Book Review
Keywords
Terror attacks, Torture, War on terror, Terror suspects
Citation
Daniel Robert Aswani (2017). Review of Bob Brecher’s Torture and the Ticking Bomb, in Asian Journal of Humanities and Social Studies. Vol. 5(5) (October 2017) 357-358.